Learn more about Pope Francis rather than criticize

[choliks]

I think it is very safe to say that actions of the Pope or any other actions that we can perform that tugs at the heart strings can get people who are close or already were Catholic to come to the Church or at least take another look at their faith. But if we leave them unsupported and just bombard with more of the same, before long, they might just see no reason again to be specifically Catholic. Everyone does charity work. Whether it be Dalai Lama or an atheist. Just because these people are good people to us, it does not mean we must listen to them blindly. That is what people remember as soon as they hear something hard to follow from the lips of any person they consider good, including even our Pope Francis. Wait till Pope Francis states something against Gay marriage or contraception publicly and you will see him treated like dirt. Most people right now are riding a wave of hope that they have that the Pope is about to change some doctrine to better match what they already believe.

So what needs to happen is that the people who come in should be given reasons to stay and understand that the Church is the true Church. That it is the true religion and the Church of Christ. Otherwise, we will just have people who follow the Pope rather than the Church. That is not what we want. We want the Pope to bring people in to the Church. Otherwise the moment we get a new Pope sometime after, people might just leave for the sole reason that they don’t like the new Pope.

I’ve read somewhere that one of the main reasons people are coming back is Pope Francis’ message of God’s mercy in his past homilies.

On the other hand, it’s not that bad if people come back just because they warmed up to Pope Francis. At least, they’re back in. Let’s pray the Holy Spirit will work in their lives, so that they won’t remain spectators and be immersed in the immensity of Christ’s love and His Church. Let’s also pray for those of us who are in the Church to welcome those who have returned, just like the father in the parable of the Prodigal Son.

 

[choliks]

These are things we assent to after we discover who to believe through reason. So once we discover the Church, we accept all its teachings, not because it makes sense but because of its authority. So we believe by faith without seeing or verifying the teachings themselves. So devotions, claims like “Bible is the Word of God”, sacraments are all accepted by faith because we have discovered the Church as the authority through reason.

What people usually forget is the initial step of verifying that authority. So they believe blindly in anything that appeals to them. That might be Buddhism, Hinduism or even Atheism. All of these are just positions we assent to when there is no reason to even think the people who tell us of these things have authority to do so.

I don’t think it’s safe to assume that these people never thought about their decisions to follow other belief systems, especially those that subscribe heavily on logic (however flawed) like atheism.

 

[JReducation]

On the Swiss Guard and sandwich thing, I’m about to burst a few bubbles here. Here goes.

Pope Francis acted exactly as his patron acted in the 13th century. There is a statute in our rule about fasting. We have three Lents in the Franciscan tradition. We are to fast and abstain during all three of them.

However, St. Francis broke the fast and the abstinence every time a brother said that he was hungry. St. Francis would order a meal prepared for the entire house and everyone would sit and eat with the hungry brother.

St. Francis also broke the fast whenever he or the friars were visiting someone and they were presented with food. He amended to the rule to say, “Let the brothers eat what is placed before them out of love.”

St. Francis was not a hippie, but he was not a cold hearted evangelist as some in the traditionalist movement try to make him out to be. He was always a man who worked from the heart to the brain. His entire order was formed to think and operate this way. Today, more than 1.7 million Franciscans operate from the heart to the brain. From affect to reason.

St. Francis knew the dangers of invasion. However, when he founded the secular order he put a prohibition into the rule. No Secular Franciscan was to bear arms for any country, pledge allegiance to any government, not was he to engage in any kind of argument, even in defense of the faith. Why not? Because it was not the loving thing to do.

These principles have given the Church more Doctors than any other religious order. They have given the Church more saints than any other religious order. They have given the Church the greatest number of religious in the Church. They have given the Church the largest secular order. They have given to the Church a patriarch whom the Church officially honors as: The Mirror of Perfection; The Perfect Christian; The Seraphic Father and The Living First Beatitude. This was a man who through is apparent carelessness and his lack of administrative talent, reformed the Church of his time.

Maybe, just maybe, this Francis is a similar kind of person. Why not let him try to be instead of wishing that he fit into a box.

St. Francis of Assisi hated boxes. That’s the reason that he founded an order that avoided all of the trappings of monastic life, even though we make the same vows as monks and have the same rights and privileges, but very few obligations in common with monks. We were founded by a reformer who did not fit into the box and we are a school of spirituality that most of you would hate if you really understood us. At least I believe that most of you would hate it from the posts that I’m reading.

Everything that I’m reading about this pope, from red shoes to sandwiches for Swiss Guards sounds like something any Franciscan pope would do. Why not let this pope be a Franciscan? That’s what he wants to be. Doesn’t he have that right?

 

[vames]

I’ve got a question, why do we have devotions to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Sacred Heart of Jesus if having faith based in the heart is such a bad thing?

Very good point
There is a kind of an understandable overreaction, I think: many traditionalists complain that after Vatican II the emphasis has been on Feelings (God is good like a mother, merciful, love is all you need, all religions can be paths towards heaven etc) to the detriment of Truth (God is a just father who punishes sinners, there is hell, the Catholic Church is the only way to salvation designed by God). So they tend to distrust instinctively everything that has to do with “the heart”, saying that feelings expose us to erroneous beliefs and so on (hence “bring back Aquinas” - see post #414). But reason alone can expose us to erroneous beliefs too, because there’s nothing as seductive as the power of reason. We can rationalize any kind of understanding of the world and pride ourselves in the quality of our reasoning. Satanism, for example, is a product of reason, a rational experiment, not a product of “the heart”.

 

[choliks]

On the Swiss Guard and sandwich thing, I’m about to burst a few bubbles here. Here goes.

Pope Francis acted exactly as his patron acted in the 13th century. There is a statute in our rule about fasting. We have three Lents in the Franciscan tradition. We are to fast and abstain during all three of them.

However, St. Francis broke the fast and the abstinence every time a brother said that he was hungry. St. Francis would order a meal prepared for the entire house and everyone would sit and eat with the hungry brother.

St. Francis also broke the fast whenever he or the friars were visiting someone and they were presented with food. He amended to the rule to say, “Let the brothers eat what is placed before them out of love.”

St. Francis was not a hippie, but he was not a cold hearted evangelist as some in the traditionalist movement try to make him out to be. He was always a man who worked from the heart to the brain. His entire order was formed to think and operate this way. Today, more than 1.7 million Franciscans operate from the heart to the brain. From affect to reason.

St. Francis knew the dangers of invasion. However, when he founded the secular order he put a prohibition into the rule. No Secular Franciscan was to bear arms for any country, pledge allegiance to any government, not was he to engage in any kind of argument, even in defense of the faith. Why not? Because it was not the loving thing to do.

These principles have given the Church more Doctors than any other religious order. They have given the Church more saints than any other religious order. They have given the Church the greatest number of religious in the Church. They have given the Church the largest secular order. They have given to the Church a patriarch whom the Church officially honors as: The Mirror of Perfection; The Perfect Christian; The Seraphic Father and The Living First Beatitude. This was a man who through is apparent carelessness and his lack of administrative talent, reformed the Church of his time.

Maybe, just maybe, this Francis is a similar kind of person. Why not let him try to be instead of wishing that he fit into a box.

St. Francis of Assisi hated boxes. That’s the reason that he founded an order that avoided all of the trappings of monastic life, even though we make the same vows as monks and have the same rights and privileges, but very few obligations in common with monks. We were founded by a reformer who did not fit into the box and we are a school of spirituality that most of you would hate if you really understood us. At least I believe that most of you would hate it from the posts that I’m reading.

Everything that I’m reading about this pope, from red shoes to sandwiches for Swiss Guards sounds like something any Franciscan pope would do. Why not let this pope be a Franciscan? That’s what he wants to be. Doesn’t he have that right?

Everybody wants Pope Francis to be their personal pope, and do their bidding. He’s not that kind of “Servant.”

 

[choliks]

Very good point
There is a kind of an understandable overreaction, I think: many traditionalists complain that after Vatican II the emphasis has been on Feelings (God is good like a mother, merciful, love is all you need, all religions can be paths towards heaven etc) to the detriment of Truth (God is a just father who punishes sinners, there is hell, the Catholic Church is the only way to salvation designed by God). So they tend to distrust instinctively everything that has to do with “the heart”, saying that feelings expose us to erroneous beliefs and so on (hence “bring back Aquinas” - see post #414). But reason alone can expose us to erroneous beliefs too, because there’s nothing as seductive as the power of reason. We can rationalize any kind of understanding of the world and pride ourselves in the quality of our reasoning. Satanism, for example, is a product of reason, a rational experiment, not a product of “the heart”.

Reminds of the conversation between Jesus and Thomas.

Jesus saith to him: Because thou hast seen me, Thomas, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed.

 

[McCall1981]

I think we can all agree that we need both faith and reason, those are the things the Church is built on. You can go to excess and abuse either of them.

Why is there an argument here? I dont think anyone here is really saying we should have just one and not the other.

 

[Eufrosnia]

I don’t think it’s safe to assume that these people never thought about their decisions to follow other belief systems, especially those that subscribe heavily on logic (however flawed) like atheism.

But you assume that Atheism is reasonable. Logical, yes! But logical does not mean something is reasonable.

At the end of the day, Atheism, just like other religions claim something unverifiable. In the case of atheism, it is that God does not exist etc. But we have no reason to think any Atheist has the authority to proclaim such a truth anyway.

 

[Eufrosnia]

On the Swiss Guard and sandwich thing, I’m about to burst a few bubbles here. Here goes.

Pope Francis acted exactly as his patron acted in the 13th century. There is a statute in our rule about fasting. We have three Lents in the Franciscan tradition. We are to fast and abstain during all three of them.

However, St. Francis broke the fast and the abstinence every time a brother said that he was hungry. St. Francis would order a meal prepared for the entire house and everyone would sit and eat with the hungry brother.

St. Francis also broke the fast whenever he or the friars were visiting someone and they were presented with food. He amended to the rule to say, “Let the brothers eat what is placed before them out of love.”

St. Francis was not a hippie, but he was not a cold hearted evangelist as some in the traditionalist movement try to make him out to be. He was always a man who worked from the heart to the brain. His entire order was formed to think and operate this way. Today, more than 1.7 million Franciscans operate from the heart to the brain. From affect to reason.

St. Francis knew the dangers of invasion. However, when he founded the secular order he put a prohibition into the rule. No Secular Franciscan was to bear arms for any country, pledge allegiance to any government, not was he to engage in any kind of argument, even in defense of the faith. Why not? Because it was not the loving thing to do.

These principles have given the Church more Doctors than any other religious order. They have given the Church more saints than any other religious order. They have given the Church the greatest number of religious in the Church. They have given the Church the largest secular order. They have given to the Church a patriarch whom the Church officially honors as: The Mirror of Perfection; The Perfect Christian; The Seraphic Father and The Living First Beatitude. This was a man who through is apparent carelessness and his lack of administrative talent, reformed the Church of his time.

Maybe, just maybe, this Francis is a similar kind of person. Why not let him try to be instead of wishing that he fit into a box.

St. Francis of Assisi hated boxes. That’s the reason that he founded an order that avoided all of the trappings of monastic life, even though we make the same vows as monks and have the same rights and privileges, but very few obligations in common with monks. We were founded by a reformer who did not fit into the box and we are a school of spirituality that most of you would hate if you really understood us. At least I believe that most of you would hate it from the posts that I’m reading.

Everything that I’m reading about this pope, from red shoes to sandwiches for Swiss Guards sounds like something any Franciscan pope would do. Why not let this pope be a Franciscan? That’s what he wants to be. Doesn’t he have that right?

You can work from heart to the brain. But if the brain part is undermined, and all we have is heart, then it won’t be fruitful.

I also do not understand why or how anyone can ever pick a religion based on the “goodness” of the person. That is unreasonable. Would you consider the Dalai Lama’s religion to be true because he is a good man according to many?

I for one have nothing against Franciscans spirituality as illustrated by the likes of St. Francis or St. Anthony of Padua. But I do have a problem with the claimed Franciscan spirituality that is usually taken synonymously with the “peace prayer” which seems to primarily think of physical poverty and coexistence as primary. And yes, things like Franciscans today in Jerusalem teaching the Quran to Muslims does very much upset me. I am not sure who would not be upset to learn that the Franciscans are equipping the very religion that is standing against Christianity and actively persecuting it. But more importantly, one would ask if that is really what St. Francis would have endorsed.

The usual line of thinking among some Franciscans is to try and speculate what St. Francis would have done. But that is like reading ones projection on to St. Francis.

Anyway, amidst all of this, I hope that we can at least agree that unless we have reason, no religion is worthy of assent.

 

[Eufrosnia]

I’ve read somewhere that one of the main reasons people are coming back is Pope Francis’ message of God’s mercy in his past homilies.

On the other hand, it’s not that bad if people come back just because they warmed up to Pope Francis. At least, they’re back in. Let’s pray the Holy Spirit will work in their lives, so that they won’t remain spectators and be immersed in the immensity of Christ’s love and His Church. Let’s also pray for those of us who are in the Church to welcome those who have returned, just like the father in the parable of the Prodigal Son.

Well the Holy Spirit works through us as well. So we must do all we can in word, deed and prayer to help those who come in to the Church or seek it.

 

[Eufrosnia]

Reminds of the conversation between Jesus and Thomas.

But this is really out of context. Jesus cannot have said that Thomas should have blindly believed in his resurrection and in Jesus himself. For one thing, the Church will condemn such a view as falling under Fideism. So you have to reconcile this passage in some other way.

As far as I can see, Jesus would have been merely telling Thomas that he should believe in the resurrected Christ because he had seen what Jesus did when he was alive. So Thomas should have already known that Jesus is authoritative.

It must be noted as well that the Church has condemned those who tried to say that the Resurrection is not historical and merely an article of faith.

 

[McCall1981]

Pope Francis is showing us how to have the heart and the head both. He’s clearly demonstrating a Franciscan spitiruality as far as compassion for the poor, but he also approved reforming the LCWR for doctrinal reasons. The two “sides” shouldnt be opposed to each other.

 

[choliks]

But you assume that Atheism is reasonable. Logical, yes! But logical does not mean something is reasonable.

At the end of the day, Atheism, just like other religions claim something unverifiable. In the case of atheism, it is that God does not exist etc. But we have no reason to think any Atheist has the authority to proclaim such a truth anyway.

I made no assumption. I only stated that atheism subscribes heavily on logic (I also think you missed the qualifier I enclosed in parentheses). I just found UNREASONABLE the sweeping assumption that those who adhere to other belief systems don’t think about what they believe.

 

[choliks]

Pope Francis is showing us how to have the heart and the head both. He’s clearly demonstrating a Franciscan spitiruality as far as compassion for the poor, but he also approved reforming the LCWR for doctrinal reasons. The two “sides” shouldnt be opposed to each other.

Like many aspects of Christ and His Church, they are not an “either/or” but “both/and”. I don’t think anybody’s advocating that the heart is greater than the mind or vice versa. There has to be balance.

 

[simple_soul]

Well the Holy Spirit works through us as well. So we must do all we can in word, deed and prayer to help those who come in to the Church or seek it.

Ok I have a question and bear with me please because if you can I beleive it might help clear up something of a bit of confusion your posts leave me in. Do you believe that elements of Truth can be found in other religions?

 

[Saints_Alive]

Pope Francis is showing us how to have the heart and the head both. He’s clearly demonstrating a Franciscan spitiruality as far as compassion for the poor, but he also approved reforming the LCWR for doctrinal reasons. The two “sides” shouldnt be opposed to each other.

I’m having an uneasy feeling about the excessive focus on the Franciscan angle. Yes, he’s obviously inspired by St Francis, but I see him as imitating Christ in his actions. Great Saints imitate Christ.

Not where you were headed with your post, but it just sparked the thought.

 

[clem456]

It seems there is considerable confusion about the terms “heart” and “faith” as they are used in Christian spirituality. It seems the assumption is that living from the “heart” implies a faith formed by emotions, swayed by emotions, actions done solely to evoke emotions. That a faith lived from the heart is unreasonable.
I really don’t have the time to flesh this out but that is not the Christian understanding of these terms. JP2’s “Faith and Reason” is a nice book in this area. Henri Nouwen has some good material also, although that will easily be misread by many. St John of the Cross is all about moving beyond emotions and the external trappings of faith.

And really. why is it assumed that when we look at what the Pope says we must say “Yea sure, but…we need to be cautious about that”. It seems people are actively looking for motivations and beliefs and modes of behavior that are not there, in the Pope and in anyone who posts on these issues. To hell with cautious faith (not the same as living imprudently!).

 

[JMJSHJ]

St. Francis knew the dangers of invasion. However, when he founded the secular order he put a prohibition into the rule. No Secular Franciscan was to bear arms for any country, pledge allegiance to any government,** not was he to engage in any kind of argument, even in defense of the faith.** Why not? Because it was not the loving thing to do.

You need to explain this better. Are you saying that a Secular Franciscan is prohibited from arguing/speaking out in favor of traditional marriage or against abortion?

 

[choliks]

You need to explain this better. Are you saying that a Secular Franciscan is prohibited from arguing/speaking out in favor of traditional marriage or against abortion?

I can’t speak for Bro. Jay, but I think what he was trying to say is that a Franciscan is not allowed to engage in arguments as it is commonly understood today, which is loud and rude. Aside from not loving, such rude and brazen behavior makes the Truth that one wants to convey unpalatable and unacceptable. It compromises, not only the messenger, but also the message’s credibility.

 

[TimothyH]

Actually, the problem is that the world has put reason down the drain. The amount of people with degrees in different fields are certainly higher. BUT, the people who want to use that critical thinking on other matters have started to decrease.

When it comes to love, meaning of life, who is Christ, or morality, people would rather listen to their “heart” and not give 2 cents about reason.

So I am afraid I strongly, and I mean very very strongly disagree with you on this. I would rather have people who are reasonable rather than people who are all emotional and thinking with their “heart”. It only takes social engineering to modify the “heart”. That is why it is so critical that one first verifies through reason what they then choose to mirror their heart after.

I also disagree that the world is obsessed with prudent action or reason. In the West especially, prudence has gone down the drain. If anything, we could use a little prudence and reason. It is the result of years of trying to discard anything prudential that has gotten us in to this mess in the first place.

Anyway, I don’t think what you say seems credible that what we need are people who just go with the heart strings. Best example of those who with the heart strings would be the Protestant and its not exactly the shining example one would like to hold up.

Ask yourself the following as well. You said

"What you call “tugging at our heart strings” might just, once in a while, and putting gay marriage aside for one microsecond (please) be the Holy Spirit prompting us into action. That feelling might just be God saying, “Do something.”

But how would you distinguish between the spirit and your own heart string if not for reason? How would one even know that they must make the distinction if not for reason?

So I feel that reason is a key part just as much as faith. There is a reason why Council of Trent condemned Fideism after all.

Relative to the bolded red section above…

There is an amazing little book titled “In the School of the Holy Spirit” by Fr. Jacques Philippe. It is a small book, less than 100 pages, and very easy to read, yet very powerful.

bks2.books.google.com/books?id=g80rrEGy7EgC&printsec=frontcover&img=1&zoom=1&edge=curl&imgtk=AFLRE72brxE_CFuIuB0G0ukXWgbc40UAQQGJV6zygTtX8pKNmb78qFTkfRQXZQ4uRrjMGt4lso2GLmrhSXqZoPWiexkY4-70_P_TIpBDfsXez2HDo6mb94_S4e1kk7iRnpLhh1S8LdXY

This book is one of the top five or six books which have had an impact in my spiritual life.

In it Father Philippe discusses exactly that, how one discerns whether a feeling is just one’s own emotional response, is from the devil, or whether a feeling is an authentic prompting of the Holy Spirit. It is possible to train oneself to to be able to discern these with reasonable certainty, and in fact, to increase the frequency and intensity of the promptings of the Holy Spirit. The heart of the matter is that one comes to know, over time, by responding.

In the School of the Holy Spirit will help you get to know the Sanctifier of your soul. It will lead you to be more attentive to the movements of the Holy Spirit in your life as you learn to love the third person of the Holy Trinity. Philippe explains the rewards of being attentive to the Holy Spirit and provides simple and concrete ways to grow in this inner sensitivity. In his clear and simple style, he illustrates his points with many examples from modern life. In the School of the Holy Spirit is a valuable aid in your own spiritual journey.

This is really much of the basis for monastic spirituality and theology, and Christianity flourished for one thousand years by doing exactly that - responding.

I would like to send you a copy of this book and really hope you will take my offer. Please check your PM’s.

-Tim-